By BILL KNIGHT Six decades after the Broadway production of Leonard Bernstein’s “West Side Story,” the Heartland Festival Orchestra this month pays musical homage to the work and to Bernstein with a musical program titled “Class Rumble” featuring accomplished timpani…
Articles
Building Middle Class
by Community Word Staff • • Comments Off on Building Middle Class
Sheriff Asbell: Despite beliefs, no crime wave
by Bill Knight • • Comments Off on Sheriff Asbell: Despite beliefs, no crime wave
BY BILL KNIGHT Many people worry about crime; they assume there’s cause. But much of that concern is an example of belief versus reality. That disconnect faces 44-year-old Brian Asbell as he starts his position as Peoria County’s new sheriff…
NOW president: Persist, Resist, Unite
by Clare Howard • • Comments Off on NOW president: Persist, Resist, Unite
BY CLARE HOWARD Some pharmacists in Florida have taken contraceptive prescriptions from women and ripped them up. Pharmacists in other states have refused to fill prescriptions for contraceptives and abortifacients. The National Organization for Women is pushing back and ramping…
Reproductive Choice: Ask Cara
by Clare Howard • • Comments Off on Reproductive Choice: Ask Cara
BY CLARE HOWARD Julia Sun and Celina Crisman were roommates at Cornell University. Sun graduated with a degree in engineering. Crisman went on to medical school and is now a surgeon. The two friends, supporters of Planned Parenthood, watched sweeping…
Unions drive economy
by Community Word Staff • • Comments Off on Unions drive economy
BY DAN SILVERTHORN Retired executive director West Central Illinois Building and Construction Trades Council Labor unions and the workers they represent helped secure the largest middle class in American history. It’s no coincidence that union membership is declining at the…
Living grains: From local fields to local flour
by Community Word Staff • • Comments Off on Living grains: From local fields to local flour
BY CLARE HOWARD Warthog Wheat stretched to the horizon and chattered in a breeze as storm clouds banked in the distance. Harold Wilken and his son Ross were anxious to get out into the field to start harvesting their organic…
Bill Nolden: “Indomitable. Indomitable. Indomitable.”
by Community Word Staff • • Comments Off on Bill Nolden: “Indomitable. Indomitable. Indomitable.”
BY TERRY BIBO Assuming life is a banquet, as Auntie Mame famously said, virtually every Peorian with an appetite for theater has had a chance to feast on the artistry of Bill Nolden. Now 90, Nolden has graced local stages,…
CW & BU host anti-hate speaker
by Community Word Staff • • Comments Off on CW & BU host anti-hate speaker
An upswing in hate and extremism is sweeping America, targeting immigrants, African Americans, Muslims and LGBT groups, but another significant victim is the American democratic ideal of social decency. Southern Poverty Law Center has been fighting hate since its formation…
Needed: Women in Leadership
by Community Word Staff • • Comments Off on Needed: Women in Leadership
Beth Crider Derry was a kindergarten teacher for 17 years before she became Peoria County’s Democratic Regional Superintendent of Schools. Derry insists there is nothing remarkable about her, save one decision she made to enroll in Illinois Women’s Institute for…